Image: Starlink
Starlink’s global growth is showing no signs of slowing down. SpaceX’s satellite internet service has officially surpassed 9 million active users worldwide, reaching the milestone at a pace that’s accelerating faster with each passing month.
In a post on X, Starlink confirmed the new figure, saying it is now “connecting more than 9M active customers with high-speed internet across 155 countries, territories and many other markets,” thanking users around the world for fueling the rapid expansion. The update marks a major jump from just 8 million customers in November and 7 million back in August.
What’s most striking is how quickly Starlink is adding new users. According to figures shared by industry watchers, the service averaged more than 21,000 new customers per day since crossing the 8 million mark — nearly 50% faster than its previous record growth rate. It took Starlink just 47 days to go from 8 million to 9 million customers, compared to 70 days for the previous million and 79 days to climb from 6 million to 7 million.
That acceleration reflects Starlink’s growing footprint and improving performance, with additional markets coming online. Global Starlink web traffic also more than doubled throughout 2025, underscoring how deeply the service is being adopted for everything from home internet to mobile and enterprise use cases.
On the infrastructure side, SpaceX continues to scale aggressively. Starlink already operates more than 9,000 active satellites in orbit and is on track to surpass 10,000 early next year. That capacity boost is expected to continue as SpaceX prepares to launch its next-generation Starlink V3 satellites next year, which are significantly larger and designed to dramatically increase network throughput, with gigabit-class speeds on the roadmap.
Expansion into new regions is also helping drive growth. Starlink is nearing a long-awaited launch in South Africa following regulatory changes, opening up another potentially massive market. At the same time, the company has been working to improve the experience for existing users, recently offering free Router Mini upgrades to customers still using first-generation hardware.
Behind the scenes, suppliers are also gearing up for what’s next, with Starlink’s chip partners signaling major expansion as SpaceX eyes even bigger ambitions, including launching V3 satellites aboard Starship and exploring future space-based AI data center concepts.
With its growth curve steepening and major technology upgrades still ahead, Starlink’s push toward global connectivity appears far from peaking.
